L.A. City Council votes to revive efforts to extend Green Line to LAX

The Los Angeles City Council has renewed efforts to extend the Metro Green Line closer to Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).

The City Council voted unanimously Friday, August 11th, to approve Councilman Bill Rosendahl’s motion to revive efforts to bring the Green Line to the airport’s front door.

In approving the proposal, the council called on Los Angeles World Airports, the city agency that operates LAX, to renew joint efforts with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) and other agencies to extend the east-west rail line to LAX.

The Green Line currently stops a half-mile short of the airport.

“This is about common sense and about bringing us into the 21st century,” Rosendahl has said. “A world class city has mass transit, and a world class airport is linked by rail to the rest of the region.”

Rosendahl’s motion called for reestablishment of the LAX/ Metro Green Line Interagency Task Force, which worked more than ten years ago to cooperatively develop the Metro Green Line Northern Extension plan to LAX and beyond.

Specifically, the Rosendahl motion requests the city Board of Airport Commissioners to reestablish the task force for the express purpose of developing a proposal for implementing a Minimum Operable Segment (MOS) within the vicinity of LAX.

The proposal includes a two-mile, two-station segment of the Green Line rail project between the 105 Freeway and the intersections of Lincoln Boulevard and Sepulveda Boulevard in Westchester.

Rosendahl said the rail connection would begin to relieve traffic congestion around the airport, and could be the “cornerstone” of a much-needed rail network serving the Westside and linking LAX to the rest of the region.

The MTA board voted in June to dust off previous Green Line studies and work with LAWA to re-examine the feasibility of the rail link to the airport.

Rosendahl’s motion requests the Board of Airport Commissioners to include the proposed Minimum Operable Segment in the update of the LAX Specific Plan.

Currently, Los Angeles World Airports, as a result of the LAX settlement agreement, is taking the first steps in developing an updated LAX Specific Plan, which will guide the coming modernization of the airport.

The council action was hailed by other area elected officials who support the Green Line extension.

“Bill Rosendahl is an extremely capable partner and I applaud the council’s action,” said Congresswoman Jane Harman. “In endorsing the Green Line extension to the airport, the council is making clear that it is imperative to relieve traffic congestion and improve passenger access to and from the fifth busiest airport in the world.”

Preliminary planning discussions between MTA and LAWA indicate that the proposed two-mile long LAX Green Line extension meets the goals of the LAX Specific Plan in addressing airport modernization, congestion and mobility, city officials said.

The LAX/Metro Green Line task force had previously developed a five-mile Green Line extension plan from the 105 Freeway to Marina del Rey, which was approved by the MTA in 1994.

But due to subsequent funding constraints, the extension was never constructed, leading to the disbandment of the task force, city officials said.